A Story I Posted In Another Forum About A Great Lead On A Possible Cache & What I Saw That Made My Heart Stop...

[Critterhunter]

Posted this elsewhere but figured somebody might find it interesting to read here as it's a good story...

One time I got a good lead on a possible cache. A man owned a home who was known to have money. There was an empty lot right next door that he owned at the time and he stayed in a shed on that empty lot at all hours of the day it seemed to my friend, as my older friend said when he was a kid that old man would freak if you went anywhere near his shed on that lot, and the shed had a dirt floor. Hmmmm....

Years later he died and the lot next door was turned over to the city due to a tax lean or something like that. His kids still owned the house and they tore it apart looking for his money because he had zero bank accounts.

So I hear this story from my older friend who had the run ins with the old man and the shed when he was a kid, and as he's lived across the street from that lot and house his whole life he said he's never see the ground disturbed or anybody detecting it. So I ask...where do you remember that shed standing and he takes me over to the spot. The lot was still city owned so no issues and there were no no tresspassing signs.

I hunted the general area of where that shed used to be thinking he buried the money in the dirt floor and suddenly I get a large signal. I dig and I see the top half of a canvas money bag type deal staring me right in the face! The top was tied carefully too! My heart was going a mile a minute. I grabbed the top of the bag and pulled it out of the ground and it was HEAVY!

Open the darn thing up and it was a bag full of old nails and nuts and bolts that he must have buried to get rid of! And no, it wasn't a prank pulled on me, as the ground and grass wasn't disturbed and the nuts/bolts/nails were so rusty you could tell it had been in the ground for a long time.

 

[xwyokid]

A few years back my brother detected a large object. Being tired of swinging the loop I told him I would dig it up. All of a sudden this metal thing comes into view, hearts were racing. As I uncovered it more we could tell it was a small tin. At that point I let him continue digging as it was his find. Long story short...Out comes the small tin and it rattles. LOL...It was half full of small washers!!

 

[E-TREC-Virginia]

The dream of every detectorist is to find a buried cache in a mason jar, a tin can, a money sack, etc.. The excitement and anticipation when you find that type of container builds 2X every minute it takes you to get it out of the hole. When you finally have it out, you give it a quick shake to hear what it sounds like, and it sounds good. Now, you're scared to open it and you're wondering if it's going to be the find of a lifetime. You're sitting there praying to the medal detecting gods and finally get the courage to look inside. BAM, it's full of silver and gold coins and then you wake up.

 

[Ism]

I've read that often a false cache or other large object was placed on top of the real one to throw would be robbers off.

 

[Elton]

Or maybe that was a marking point for 3 steps left two right one left..and bingo the money hole !!!........

 

[Critterhunter]

MAN, you guys are KILLING ME! I can't honestly remember if I re-swept that hole after that! When you said that I was thinking...Maybe it was a decoy that he buried to see if anybody was watching and dug it up, and then a few weeks later when he saw it wasn't dug up he buried the real thing? Or the real thing buried deeper under it like you said...Yea, I could see that. I always re-sweep my holes but I was so rattled by that frick'in bag I don't remember if I did or not. It's been several years too. The lot is still there though, so maybe I'll hit it again some time.

I've got another great cache lead story but I'm so tired right now it'll have to wait...

 

[Ron from Michigan]

Elton,has a good point,the cache is probably under the false target.Good Luck Ron

 

[Critterhunter]

Very well might have been. Can't remember if I re-swept that spot because that bag had me really rattled and it's been several years.

The other story is this...One time I was out hunting (not metal detecting) with a couple guys in a body of woods they lived near. They didn't know me real well or that I detect so no issues with wild goose chase potential. Somehow the conversation came up about a site in the woods nearby where a house use to stand and the one guy said "Yea, I grew up in that house and it burned down in the 70's."

Anyway, I had seen the site and there was no trace of a house being there other than a few large stones and a well and some other odd block/cement type stuff with bolders lining a ditch that was more hidden by some thicker young trees.

So he mentioned "When my dad was on his death (before the house burned down) he mentioned to me he had buried a large cache of silver coins near the cistern, so I went out and got a metal detector (obviously a 1970's model because the house had burned down in the 70's) and tried to find the coins but I never could find anything."

So I played it cool. Didn't act too interested, because these guys weren't close friends of mine where I'd feel the need to share, and that nearby section of woods just happened to be owned now by my uncle's friend. So next I headed off to my uncle's and asked him if he remembers that house burning down in the 70's and he said "yep". And I asked about they guy's dad passing away and he says "yep".

It all seemed to be adding up to maybe being a true story. So with my plans in hand I headed off to that site and hunted around what at the time I assumed was the "cistern". I never knew what that was before really and always assumed it was another name for a well, and the old well was easy to hunt around so I just assumed.

Needless to say I didn't find any large signals, even hunting in all metal. Later on down the road I found out what a cistern actually was and that in fact it was the cement/blockish type of thing I had seen further into the thicker part of these woods nearby but I had never hunted. By the time I found out my mistake the woods there had been mowed down and the ground sloped into a small hill to shield a new home development they built there.